Life on Mars, ABC

Yes, but there is no reason to assume that class were distinguished among the Romans by an accent. It is also not as though there were any need to distinguish a Praetorian centurion by his accent--making him sound like a typical Brit Sergeant Major is just gilding the lily, we can tell by looking that he is a soldier with a certain amount of authority. I suggest the use of the accent was an act of artistic pandering.

I see the many questions have been answered.

It is indeed a yank series. We do indeed enjoy English humor (and drama). We can't fathom the extreme dialects of England.

SciFi is a very minor part of the show. Personally, I wish it has a bigger part.

Re the dialects.

Australians can fathom them, and our accent is as different from the Brit ones as yours are.

I think it's maybe a bit of laziness, or insularity? It's a matter of getting used to difference.

We have learned to fathom most of your extreme accents, though it's often hard in films, I must say.

There are American accents which are almost incomprehensible to other Americans. For example the accent of rural Maine is almost impossible for someone from the coastal islands of the Carolinas (Old South, Atlantic coast), and their accents are almost impossible from "Down Easters" (people from New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine).

The people in Los Angeles, however, are from another planet, and have made remarkable progress in sounding like American newsreaders.

Oh come on! We try. I've been watching british tv and movies my entire life. I fianlly gave up trying and now I use the subtitles when I can.

I don't believe you have heard our extreme accents!

By the way, i can understand the accents--after all they aren't using Norfolk accents or Cornish accents. But my point was how very silly it is to use "generic" working class accents, and public school accents, to signal the viewer what "kind" of person they're dealing with. In fact, it has only been within the last century (less, really) that English society has achieved the easy mobility in the social scale which so long characterized the Roman empire, and which was one of its great strengths. Caius Iulius Caesar, for example, was from a provincial (Campania) family which had long before had a single Patrician intermarriage, and upon that tenuous basis, he began his public career. Most of the Emperors who succeeded Nero were not even born in Italy.

ABC has an online viewer where you can watch it (the US vesion) as well as Lost and other shows at:
http://abc.go.com/player/index?pn=index

I watched a couple of episodes of Life on Mars but didn't really get into it. I do like Lost a lot, though. I hadn't seen Lost at all until recently. Went back and caught up with all of it before this season using that site.

So what is the major part of the show? From the responses so far, I gather that it's a US show, that there's a British show of the same name, and that Harvey Keitel is starring in it (the US show).

But what is it about?

It's about a police department set in 1973 NYC. Harvey Keitel is the precinct head (what ever that's called). One of the employees had some sort of accident in 2008 and woke up in 1973. They deal with crimes a la 1973 as well as showcasing how much has changed since then, socially.

That does sound interesting. So it's some kind of Austin-Powers-in-reverse deal? Or more intelligent than that?

Not campy. I'd call it a light fantastical drama peppered with comedy.

Ooooh ... now I've got to go check it out on Google.

Ha! Two minutes into ABC's the trial episode, I'm seeing two Sopranos actors. Good start!

Yeah, Michael Imperioli is the highlight of the show for me. He funny.

Have so!!!


And, if you can't understand, you haven't tried hard enough.

That being said, I much prefer lots of American shows with subtitles...I can usually get the accents, but there's a lot of mumbling WITH accents.

But I am way deaf.

Sounds like the rare example where the copy is better than the original!!!

Eh? wassat?

And I say, ok...but media use shortcuts.

Language may be unfaithful to history (though frankly I doubt all classes spoke the same in ancient Rome) but it is a damn fine indicator for many modern audiences....and pre-modern.


It's a device, ok?

Actually, this was the example of a US re-make I had in mind when I questioned US re-makes, earlier in the thread. There is absolutely no way a re-make (set in another culture) could have worked. Kath & Kim is very (Oz) culturally specific - & not just a language thing, so much more.
It has had a huge following in Oz because it so accurately depects a particular segment of society so well .. with cutting humour & affection at the same time. If you like, it is an example of Australians having a really good laugh (minus malice) at themselves.
So when the news of a US re-make was revealed, the wide-spread reaction was: "What? Impossible! Ridiculous!" And even though I personally wasn't a devotee of K & K, I was as gobsmacked at the idea as everyone else. Everyone knew it couldn't work! The idea was akin to the notion of an Oz re-make of The Sopranos, or say, Fawlty Towers. Bizarre.

Although "Underbelly" is kind of Sopranoesque, nicht wahr?

But crime and families and sturm und drang is universal....


Kath and Kim are DEFINITELY culturally specific.

America could like make a decent enough show about their cultural equivalents, though.

Whatever the hell they are.